Find research datasets worth reusing

Search datasets from major research repositories and use ShareScore to quickly assess how well each record supports discovery, access, and reuse.

datasets available to search

ShareScore release 0.9.0

Dataset results

7 results for “Nicrophorus orbicollis”

Learn how ShareScore rates datasets ↗

dryad36/100

Can age-related changes in parental care modulate inbreeding depression? A test using the burying beetle, Nicrophorus orbicollis

Parental care has been shown to reduce the magnitude of inbreeding depression in some species with facultative care. However, parents often vary in the quality or amount of care they provide to their offspring and it is less clear whether this variation also impacts the magnitude of inbreeding depression. Here, we tested whether age related changes in parental care modulate the expression of inbreeding depression in the burying beetle, Nicrophorus orbicollis. Consistent with previous studies, we found that older parents produced larger broods of offspring than younger parents without sacrificing mean larval mass. Inbreeding depression was evident in several fitness-related traits: brood size at dispersal, the proportion of the brood that survived to eclosion, and mean age at death were all reduced in inbred broods compared to outbred broods. Surprisingly, inbred offspring were heavier at dispersal than outbred offspring. This was likely due to reduced sibling competition in inbred broods. Despite evidence for age related changes in parental investment and the existence of inbreeding depression, there was no evidence that an interaction between the two influenced any of the traits we measured. Our results suggest that age-related changes in parental care may be too slight to influence the expression of inbreeding depression.

opencc-zeroSep 2022View details →

dryad36/100

Natural history data for Nicrophorus orbicollis

Burying beetles of the genus Nicrophorus have become a model for studying the evolution of complex parental care in a laboratory. Nicrophorus species depend on small vertebrate carcasses to breed, which they process and provision to their begging offspring. However, vertebrate carcasses are highly sought after by a wide variety of species and so competition is expected to be critical to the evolution of parental care. Despite this, the competitive environment for Nicrophorus is rarely characterized in the wild and remains a missing factor in laboratory studies. Here, we performed a systematic sampling of Nicrophorus orbicollis living near the southern extent of their range at Whitehall Forest in Clarke County, Georgia, USA. We determined the density of N. orbicollis and other necrophilous species that may affect the availability of this breeding resource through interference or exploitation competition. In addition, we characterize body size, a key trait involved in competitive ability, for all Nicrophorus species at Whitehall Forest throughout the season. Finally, we compare our findings to other published natural history data for Nicrophorines. We document a significantly longer active season than was observed twenty years previously at Whitehall Forest for both N. orbicollis and Nicrophorus tomentosus, potentially due to climate change. As expected, the adult body size of N. orbicollis was larger than N. tomentosus, the only other Nicrophorus species that was captured in 2022 at Whitehall Forest. The other most prevalent insects captured included species in the families Staphylinidae, Histeridae, Scarabaeidae, and Elateridae, which may act as competitors or predators of Nicrophorus young. Together, our results indicate significant variation in intra- and interspecific competition relative to populations within the N. orbicollis range. These findings suggest that the competitive environment shows extensive spatiotemporal variation, providing the basis to make predictions for how ecology may influence parenting in this species.

opencc-zeroMar 2023View details →

dryad36/100